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As the Senior Director at Queen’s Partnerships and Innovation (QPI), Kelly Nolan leads in the development and execution of collaborative institutional strategies that include leveraging the power and promise of big data, high-performance computing, and artificial intelligence. Her work is backed by more than 20 years’ experience supporting national research initiatives in these fields, using her skills in building partnerships, business development, marketing communications, and reputation management.

Before arriving at QPI, Kelly served as Simon Fraser University’s strategic partnership lead in Ottawa, focused on federal funding opportunities, industry engagement and leveraging partnerships in the health, government, defence, manufacturing and community-engaged research sectors. While at Compute Canada, Nolan secured more than $125 million in federal government funding to improve Canada’s research supercomputer infrastructure. Knowledgeable about government programs and industry/academic alliances, Kelly has established influential connections and partnerships with a varied network of industry, association, and government leaders. While Co-Chair of Women in High Performance Computing, Kelly led the development of several international programs as well as serving on the program committee for SC19, a key high-performance computing conference program held in Denver in 2019.

Thanks to her strong background in thought leadership, Kelly is much sought after to speak at events and deliver keynote addresses and has had opinion pieces published in several national newspapers.

Going forward, her expertise and dedication to excellence will have a significant impact on research and innovation partnerships at Queen’s, and she is keen to use her experience to build strategic alliances and partnerships that support Queen’s University’s research communities.

What’s the best part of your job?
Working with researchers and supporting their work. I learn new things from the best experts every day.

What’s the one thing you would tell any researcher to do before they come to you?
Build the partnerships you need early and understand the power of maintaining strong, collaborative relationships for future success.

What is an important piece of advice you'd want researchers to know about?
Working in partnership and adapting to a co-creation model can open up opportunities and pathways that will have incredible impact.